CGSwans flies north for the winter

Vienna was one of four Natural History museums that were always going to make the cut, as was the one in Paris. Two big ones to come, plus any others where the mood takes me.

All three of Valencia, Lisbon and Osaka are close. Osaka has an exceptional design which I can best describe as filling the Guggenheim Museum in New York with water and then climbing in from the roof. Lisbon has it covered not on design but in quality and depth of small exhibits, which are largely absent at Osaka. And Valencia wins over both because I think the design is a cut above any traditional approach to an aquarium. But I'd visit all three again in a heartbeat.

 

@Chlidonias: The Senckenberg does still have a room dedicated to the Messel fossils. Karlsruhe Natural History Museum also has a modest display.

@CGSwans: Thanks for all the thoroughly enjoyable write-ups. Zurich is my favourite European zoo, as well.

 

For what it's worth, although not common, there are Japanese giant salamanders in American collections as well. The only zoos on this continent I know that have Chinese giants are LA and Toronto. From what I've read, Prague recently acquired a large number that may well be the start of a captive breeding program (one hopes).

I came to this thread only recently, but I've enjoyed catching up on your stories, @CGSwans. I appreciate your storytelling techniques; reviews are good, but stories are more interesting

 

I have seen both Japanese and Chinese giant salamander.

 

Batman says: Chinese

 

This is a terrific thread and one that I eagerly look forward to each day...keep up the great work @CGSwans ! I do want to discuss one topic:

The USA has several world-class aquariums (Shedd, Monterey Bay, Georgia), several others that would be amongst the best of their kind in just about any other nation (Baltimore, Tennessee, Aquarium of the Pacific, Mystic) and by my latest count there is at least 147 public aquariums in total. The sheer volume of aquatic facilities in America is staggering, especially when one considers that several more seem to open every year. Japan has establishments such as Osaka, Sumida, Churaumi and at least 80 more public aquariums. Then there is Valenica, Lisbon, Genoa, etc., throughout Europe and many huge establishments in China.

My overall point is this one: where is the great German aquarium? Does such a thing exist? Germany is often regarded as perhaps the #1 or #2 zoo nation on the planet as it is generally accepted that USA and Germany are leagues ahead of everyone else in terms of quantity and probably quality as well. Why doesn't Germany have a world-class, mega aquarium amidst its 500+ zoos?

 

Have they been infected by the Merlin virus yet? It has reached a terminal status in Australia.

By the way: 'the sheer volume of aquatic facilities in America...' - pun intended, I hope?

 

Thank you (and to everybody else who has said similar). 'Tis very kind.

I'm conscious that for the most part I'm mostly treading well-worn paths. There would be absolutely no point in me trying to describe Vienna, so an impression, and perhaps the odd vignette, makes much more sense.

 

You got the pun! The USA now has 8 Sea Life franchises when a decade ago I think that there was perhaps ZERO. How times have changed.

 

Germany already has a "great", or rather "grand" aquarium, as pointed out in another thread: the Ozeaneum in Stralsund, locally known as "The Bog Rolls" due to its exterior. Furthermore, there are several larger zoo aquaria (Berlin, Cologne, Hamburg, Leipzig, Stuttgart etc.), public aquaria such as Aquazoo Düsseldorf, Zehla Mellis, the Müritzeum, Meereszentrum Burg auf Fehmarn etc. as well as a dwindling but still present number of SeaLife centres. The latter might be the main reason why no truly grand public aquarium has been established in Germany so far. And given that the Ozeaneum has a hard time keeping up visitor numbers or financing further development, this won't change any time soon.

 

Let's try this again, not using an unedited draft this time. I struggle mightily with writer's block, and often can't bear to read back what I bash out, especially when I feel it's turgid rubbish. But I shall try to do better.

Zoo #20 - Zoo Bratislava, 30/04/2017

This might be one stop that few people saw coming.

I hadn't intended to visit Slovakia until quite late in my planning stage, when I was looking at the train route from Vienna to my next destination and discovered that it apparently passed through Slovakia. This would not do: I could not physically enter a country without doing any more than look out the window of a train. It would be Schrodinger's visit: I would simultaneously have been in, but not *been in*, Slovakia. There was nothing else for it to make a day trip from Vienna, and so Bratislava took its place on the itinerary. As it turns out, I was looking at the wrong route, and my train didn't pass through Slovakia after all. So my trip was unnecessary, but never mind. I enjoyed the afternoon well enough.

Bratislava is my first 'post-Communist' zoo. It's a category that I have some interest in exploring, because it encompasses some of the most well-regarded zoos in Europe - especially those noted for the breadth of their collections, such as the Tierpark and Plzen - as well as many that might be considered as sub-standard. I wonder, is there any meaning to calling a zoo 'post-Communist', or has enough time passed that variations in government support, average incomes in host cities and the strength or otherwise of the local tourist industry speak more to what each zoo has become since 1989 than does whatever they were before that year?

It's fair to say Bratislava does not rank among those post-Communist zoos that make it into the continent's top tier. There are a couple of bits and pieces that are indeed sub-standard, and unpardonably so, but the overall sense I had when leaving was that it has unrealised potential, and that much of that potential can be realised without simply wishing away what I am sure are some tight budget constraints. No zoo director wants to have the problems Bratislava has.

I am thinking specifically of two exhibits. A brown bear inhabits a pair of mid-20th century concrete bear pits, each perhaps the size of a typical lounge room, and has access to the night den between them so it can choose which of the three spaces it uses. In defence of Bratislava, this at least shows they have done what they can to maximise the bear's space, but three times an unacceptable habitat is still an unacceptable habitat if space is not the only problem. And space is not the only problem. This is exactly the sort of exhibit that must be driven out of reputable zoos everywhere, at the greatest possible speed, not only for the benefit of the bear, but to protect the reputation of good zoos everywhere. We all rail at the more mendacious claims of animal rights activists, but if we want to defend our institution we have to discredit their arguments. Bratislava's bear exhibit discredits ours' instead.

The other unacceptable problem is the Hamadryas baboon exhibit, which is a cage for (I think only) two baboons that is closer in size to a tamarin enclosure than anything I'd like to put baboons in. I don't mind its ugliness - it looks like a cell from Alcatraz - but I do mind that a highly active, intelligent and social species doesn't have adequate opportunities for activity, stimulation and social behaviour.

Less seriously, in relation to the baboons, was perhaps the most unintentionally amusing sign I've ever seen in a zoo. The cage is up a series of steps, and not overly noticeable from the main path. So a sign points towards it, saying it is only 20 paces, up eight steps to the cage. All well and good, but obviously somebody in head office feared encountering an angry guest who had counted out 21 paces on their way to the baboons, because in finer print it specifies that it is "measured by average female step, using an average long (sic) of female legs". I admire the attention to detail and scientific rigour, if not the translation.

There appears to be three areas of relatively recent (ie, post-2000) development. There's a series of identical big cat complexes for lions, white tigers, leopards and jaguars, with each consisting of a small (too small, really) outdoor yard and a separate night quarters, but for three of the four species (the lions being the exception) each of these were occupied. There was a tiger outside and one shut inside, and the same for the leopards and jaguars. I don't really understand how that's sustainable as an ongoing management practice, and it's certainly a poor situation for the cats. They need to pick two species and move two out.

The apes building - for groups of chimpanzees and orangutans - is much better. Both species have big, useful spaces both inside and out. One thing I realised here was that, wherever I go and regardless of the conditions outside, animals that have access to indoor quarters tend to use them. It was a lovely sunny day, with not a single ape outside.

The zoo's best offering is a heavily forested section with a couple of Eurasian exhibits, including an *enormous* enclosure for grey wolves. It's just a simple wire fence enclosing native forest, but it's big, it's undulating, it's complex and it's just about perfect for the two wolves. There's also big yards here for wisent, kulan and red deer, the latter of which recedes so far off into the depths of the forest that I couldn't pick where it ended. I would dearly love to see the same approach taken for a new bear exhibit in this same part of the zoo.

If that's an indication of Bratislava's future then it's relatively bright. The zoo occupies a very large site - there's lots of walking between groups of exhibits - and there is a lot that could be done here without resorting to financial magical thinking. There's an enormous empty paddock - probably about 3 hectares in size - that separates a section of ancient enclosures for rhinos, hyenas and emus (among others) from the rest of the zoo. With some relatively moderate development it could become an excellent savannah exhibit for the zoo's zebras and antelopes, and with a bit more investment the giraffes and perhaps even rhinos could go here too.

I wouldn't be increasing the size of the collection, though. They already have all of the basic ABC animals except elephants, penguins, seals and hippos, and I suspect all of them would stretch the resources of this place too far.

All in all, I don't think Bratislava qualifies as a "good zoo", but it's mostly an acceptable one, with the wolf exhibit a notable bright spot. With the exception of the over-stocked big cat section, they have done a reasonably good job of opening up previously undersized exhibits to provide more space for fewer animals - the rhino and hyena exhibits are notable examples where what were clearly multiple exhibits in the past are now single enclosures.

I hope they continue down this path. I'll be watching with interest to see what their next move is: as long as it involves baboons or a bear I'll be happy.

 

Cincinnati keeps the species, too, as well as the Japanese species and hellbenders.

 

Thank you for another excellent report. Bratislava is interesting: I've not been for many years - 1995 - but then, and now, I think, the difference in quality between it (decidedly rough around the edges) and the Czech zoos (mostly excellent) was and is marked. Given that the other zoos of Slovakia are fairly ordinary, at best, the interesting question is raised as to why two countries that are so close - geographically, historically and socially - should have such very different rosters of zoos.

 

@sooty mangaby: a common reply from the Slovak pov to that is that the Czech are and always have been more apt at obtaining money...^^

 

Are you going to visit the Balkans (or have you ever been in Southeast Europe), CGSwans? Maybe Croatia with its good Zagreb zoo (with new Madagascar complex and very interesting reptiles (bushmaster snake, tentacled snake, Fiji-short crested iguana, etc., and small mammals like potto), or even the ancient, extremely southern Athens in Greece with the nice Attica zoological park (I have been here)? The Greek beaches are best I think in the whole world (or if I need to chose between Spain and Greece for summer beaches,I will chose Greece) for summer activities (safe of sharks, excellent sunny and dry weather, and very warm and calm sea) and the many wonderful Greek islands like Santorini, Crete, Milos or Zakynthos?

 

We shall see where the railroad takes me, Nikola.

 

Zoo #21 - Budapest Zoo, 4/5/2017

The day after visiting Bratislava, I was back at Vienna Hauptbahnhof. As with Antwerp, I could have caught a train to the west, to Munich and perhaps onto Western Germany. I could have caught a train North, to Prague and the zoological delights of Czechia, and perhaps onto Berlin or Leipzig. Instead I headed southeast to Budapest.

I wasn't too sure what to expect of Budapest Zoo. I knew that it was a traditional - perhaps one might say unreconstructed - city zoo that had retained a large collection even as most of its similarly-sized counterparts had moved out of at least some bigger species. I wasn't expecting Vienna or even Antwerp, but hopefully it would be on a par with Barcelona, or at least Ueno Zoo in Tokyo.

I arrived at around 10:30 - my usual tendency to lay about the hostel for far too long was countered this time by my plan to visit the thermal baths after I was done with the zoo. The baths are outrageously expensive, but they were worth every forint to me. The warm water worked wonders after two months of hostel beds and long hours spent on trains and buses. I can move all my muscles again!

At first I worked my way around the left-hand side of the zoo in a clockwise fashion (later reversing myself for the other half, after stopping for lunch, so that I ultimately covered the zoo in something approximating an infinity symbol-pattern), and started with the South American tropical house first. It's one of the most antiquated of its type I have visited, and the humidity in here was a touch stifling. It's a strange one because while it is explicitly tropical themed it also housed arid exhibits (representing the Mohave desert, if my memory serves me properly), and the main hall was severely underused, due to what appeared to be a complete lack of birds in an eminently suitable space for small neotropical birds. Odd.

I hadn't been aware of the antique aquarium floor below the tropical house until I stumbled into it: it's nice, but I found the allocation of tanks just plain strange. Several small tanks had been consolidated into one for small pet shop tropicals, while much larger fish made do with much smaller spaces.

Next up was the Australian zone. I was much more curious about this than I might normally be because Budapest must have close to, if not the most substantial collection of Australian fauna anywhere in Europe, if not the entire world outside of Australia. In addition to the standard macropods there are koalas, wombats, an echidna, a quoll and even feathertail gliders. There's lots of parents and a decent number of reptiles too. Does anybody know the history of how Budapest came to have so many Australians? There are a great number of Australians of genus Homo around too, just by the by. We made up a quarter or so of my hostel. Also in this part of the zoo is a large aviary for half a dozen keas - it's great to see Budapest recognising the proper status of our rebellious seventh state, which we have not yet got around to bringing under control (we need more sheepdogs).

The centre of the zoo features a broadly polar-themed area that houses polar bears, sea lions and the seemingly ubiquitous Waldrapp ibis, which have a walk-through aviary. The bears - a duo - were apparently young and new to the zoo. There's also a large complex of lemur islands and a walk-through for ring-tailed and black lemurs that has both indoors and outside parts (or they could have been separate enclosures. I forget now). There are also golden-bellied mangabeys here. Adjacent to this is a decent pair of enclosures for gorillas and orangutans - though the gorillas were all inside as maintenance work was performed.

At this point I was ready to declare myself moderately pleased with Budapest, which clearly had more than its share of legacy issues to address but was of at least fair quality.

Things picked up further when I went into the 'Magic Mountain', which is one of the best renovations of existing, antiquated zoo architecture I've seen. It's effectively a biology museum that sprawls across four floors, built inside the larger of the zoo's two concrete mountains, and intersperses live exhibits - from insects to coral to finches and naked mole rats - to tell the story of evolution. It's an excellent exhibit and by far the best the zoo has to offer, at least conceptually.

That was the high point of the visit. I gave the remainder of the zoo relatively short thrift: I was suffering horribly from hay fever, which I hadn't come pre-armed for, and I wanted to get along to the baths too. But the primary reason I loved through the right half of the zoo was because it simply isn't very good. There are downright crappy small yards for elephants and rhinos: the latter had only one outdoor space but three rhinos held separately, so that two were locked in night quarters. There's a rocky, barren 'savannah' that houses giraffes and various antelope. A row of big cat (plus striped hyena) exhibits are ok-ish, but small.

In the vicinity of the carnivores is the Venomous Creatures House - a very nice small room on the first floor for (primarily) venomous snakes - though the first time I went through I didn't find the stairs, and all I could find were giant tortoises and Komodo dragons. I was a touch confused. There's also an almost hidden building for a range of small animals - fish, amphibians, reptiles and a couple of rodents - that I eventually determined was a Hungarian natives exhibit, but which wasn't signed as such, at least in English.

I think Budapest has some good features - the Magic Mountain is first rate, the collection is solid and bits and pieces of the architecture have character. But I don't think it's a good zoo. It's not apparent that the reckoning all small urban zoos must face - of whether they can adequately provide for all their species - has happened here. At a minimum, Budapest needs to go out of elephants - for which there is no prospect of developing a suitably-sized enclosure - and turn that space over to the rhinos. It's close to par with Ueno for big animals, though Tokyo's is the better zoo because of the higher standard of its indoor exhibits. It's not the equal of Barcelona, alas.

This thread will not quite grind to a halt, but will certainly slow down over the next few weeks, as I head further away from the zoo heartland of Central Europe. Budapest was zoo number 21 on day number 53: It's possible, but far from certain that I will hit 30 before day 100.